Change of pants time – add a website link to your YouTube video!

Yes, you really can now add a website link to your YouTube video.

When showing the title of this blog post around the office, one person did think that I meant I only change my pants on special occasions…I meant we are so excited we wet ourselves…well almost.

Yesterday Youtube announced that:

Associated Website annotations links provide verified partners who are in good standing a way to annotate to their website directly from their videos

WOOHOOO !!! (What does this mean?)

In simple terms this means that some channels will now be able to have a link directing traffic from their film to their website. The only way we’ve been able to do this before is by running an ad campaign then you can add a call to action bar. Here is an example:

Or by embedding links on the channel page header as seen here on TeachPE.com (Partners can already link to their sites through their channel pages):

Here’s an exclusive example of the new annotation!

How can you do this?

Firstly, your channel needs to be associated with your website. You also need to be a verified partner. This has become easier to do over the last year. On your journey to become a partner, we’ve found a good way to improve your chances of acceptance is to enable your channel to accept advertising.

Be warned though, if you have films which use music that you don’t have permission for Youtube reserves the rights to remove them.

The example on the left is from a verified partners channel. The one on the right is not.

Next, go into your channel settings and click on your ‘Associated Website’ . There are a number of ways of verifying your website – the easiest way is to download a piece of HTML and then upload it to your site. Google will, however, talk you through the process.

And that’s it, you can now put a link back to your site using an annotation.

What does this mean?

When we first started using Youtube it was standard practice to put a link to the website in the description.

This enables us to divert traffic directly from the film to the clients website. Now you can do this directly on the video – diverting people from YouTube to your site.A very powerful call to action.

Your YouTube video just became a more powerful device for attracting people to your website.

But remember the golden rule of of Time Watched!

If you are going to take advantage of this – remember to place it near the end of your film. You don’t want to be directing people off the film as soon as they arrive or your ‘Time Watched’ will be affected and subsequently your films rank.

Don’t confuse your viewer

Don’t confuse the viewer with too many calls to action, or if you do have more than one, make it very clear what the benefit of each is.

Choose your weapon

As you know, we are strong advocates of choosing the right style of film for its purpose. This now applies to your Youtube Channel.

Quite simply, do you want to attract people to your website or do you want them to subscribe to your channel?

If you’re after diverting traffic to your website then utilise this new tool. Those wanting to utilise the future of YouTube by enforcing their channel will want to keep as many people on that channel as possible without diverting them away, encouraging them to join your community and share your films. Ideally, you want to do both.

We’re always keen on feedback here at Curveball, so if you want to get to know the team writing these blogs better, check out our team video – the 6 hour working day experiment:

Follow us for future blog posts.

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A little about us

We get excited by engaging videos that audiences want to watch. We get even more excited when they’ve been optimsed so people can find them. Give us a call on 01603 928370 or 0203 7642437 and we'll be happy to help you understand how film or animation can work for your business.